(BOSTON 5/3/2024) – On Tuesday, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey signed a supplemental budget into law that funds the state’s emergency shelter system for the remainder of Fiscal Year 2024 and provides a glide path into Fiscal Year 2025 while instituting reforms to ensure the integrity and financial stability of the program. The bill further extends certain COVID-era flexibilities, most notably allowing for permanent outdoor dining options and restaurants to sell cocktails to-go, as well as expanding nursing eligibility to graduate students and certain staff in assisted living facilities. The legislation was approved by the full Legislature last week.
The bill includes targeted funding to support families exiting the shelter system, puts reasonable limitations on the length of time families can remain in the program, creates a recurrent certification requirement to ensure program participants are complying with eligibility requirements, and establishes a commission to study the future of the shelter program.
“Nothing Massachusetts can do will make up for Washington, D.C.’s inaction on our broken immigration system, but I believe this supplemental budget bill represents a first step in getting the crisis facing our emergency shelter system under control,” said Senator Michael Moore (D-Millbury). “Coming to a yes vote was not easy for me – voting no would mean letting funding run out for our emergency housing system which would lead to pain and suffering for migrants and Bay State residents alike, while voting yes would mean continuing to let Massachusetts taxpayers bear the burden of a failing federal immigration system. I believe voting yes was the right thing to do for Massachusetts, but with that being said, it is absolutely imperative that our representatives on Capitol Hill step up to do their jobs and pass the recently negotiated bipartisan Senate immigration bill.”
The legislation allocates $251 million for Fiscal Year 2024 shelter costs, which includes $10 million for approved workforce training programs; $10 million for a tax credit for companies that provide job training to Emergency Assistance (EA) participants; $3 million for family welcome centers; $1 million for supplemental staffing at emergency housing assistance program shelters, and $7 million for resettlement agencies and shelter providers to assist families with rehousing, work authorization, and English language learning.
Addressing the long-term needs of the shelter system, the supplemental budget additionally authorizes up to $175 million in funds from the transitional escrow fund to place the shelter system on a fiscally sustainable glide path into FY 2025.
The legislation requires the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities (EOHLC) to create a rehousing plan and provide case management for all individuals in shelters to help them successfully exit the program, and requires recertification every 60 days for families to remain eligible. Beginning June 1, 2024, the total length of stay would be limited to nine months, at the end of which families would be eligible for up to two 90-day extensions.
Extensions would be based on circumstances that include employment or participation in a workforce training program, veteran status, imminent placement in housing, avoiding educational interruptions for children in public school, pregnancy or having recently given birth, diagnosed disability or medical condition, a single parent caring for disabled child or family member, a single parent without adequate childcare, and risk of harm due to domestic violence.
Families who face the end of their shelter time limit may be granted a hardship waiver from the Administration, and all families would need to be provided with 90 days' notice before terminating benefits.
To ensure the long-term sustainability of the shelter system, the legislation establishes a commission to study the future of the shelter program. It creates a tax credit for employers to provide workforce training to families in shelter and includes robust reporting to ensure close monitoring of how the administration is managing the shelter program.
The legislation also requires the Governor to seek federal approvals for a waiver from the federal Department of Homeland Security to permit expedited, temporary, and provisional work authorizations for newly arriving migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers. These authorizations are key to creating pathways to work to ultimately alleviate the shelter capacity crisis.
Previously, during Senate debate, Senator Moore voted to support a number of amendments, including Amendment 26 which would direct resettlement agencies to work more closely with the Healey Administration to help better forecast its shelter capacity and ensure the Commonwealth always has space for those who need it, as well as Amendment 49 which would have allowed officials to take into account an individual’s length of residency in Massachusetts when determining priority for emergency shelter. These amendments did not win approval into the final bill.
Conversely, Senator Moore did secure an amendment that reallocates funds that were previously earmarked for the Worcester Fire Department in the FY24 budget, allowing the dollars to be broadly used to purchase equipment for the department. The funding was originally meant to purchase “a self-contained breathing apparatus vehicle,” but due to the Governor’s 9C cuts, the original $350,000 earmark was cut in half and could no longer cover the entire cost of the vehicle.
Pandemic era policies made permanent in the legislation include allowing outdoor dining and craft-made mixed drinks to-go, allowing graduates and students in their last semester of nursing education programs to practice nursing, in accordance with guidance from the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Nursing; and permitting remote reverse mortgage counseling. It extends for one year the ability of nurses employed by assisted living residences to provide skilled nursing care in accordance with valid medical orders, provided the nurse holds a valid license to provide such care.
Having been passed by the House of Representatives and Senate and received the signature of the Governor, the bill now becomes law.
###